"... In a World Telling Them Not To"

"Shout-out to all the women trying to love themselves in a world telling them not to." This popped up on my Instagram feed recently and it rubbed me the wrong way. Now, don't get me wrong, I think everyone should love themselves, but the thing that bugged me is the "in a world telling them not to" bit. It seems to be a predominate message these days that the "world" or society is holding people back and telling them they are not worthy. While I agree that the intent of this message is positive - designed to make people feel proud of loving themselves, which is great - it does it in the same breath as telling them that the world doesn't want them to.

I'm going to go out in left field for a minute, so bear with me. Have you ever been totally fine with someone until an outside party tells you that he/she doesn't like you? Suddenly you pick up on an underlying attitude. Seemingly benign statements suddenly have an undercurrent of resentment or passive-aggressiveness. All of their actions come under additional scrutiny looking for ill-intent or underlying meaning.

In general, what we expect to see in the world, we see. If we look around, expecting the world to push us down and tell us negative things about ourselves, that is unquestioningly what we are going to see. Looking at the world through that lens is going to take every one of our insecurities and magnify them.I am plus-sized. If I turn on the TV and see that most actors/actresses aren't plus-sized, should I take that to mean that I'm not worthy? No. If I get on a plane and feel squished in the small seats, should I take that to mean that the airline thinks I'm not worthy? No. They try to squeeze as many people as they can to increase their profit margin. My knees are also jammed into the seat in front of me because I'm tall. Should I feel bad about being tall? 

There is always going to be negativity in the world, especially on the internet, but what if we shifted our perspective? What if, instead of telling children that the world wants them to fail because they are part of one group or another, we told them that if they work hard, they can do anything? What if we raised our kids to feel good about themselves without requiring external validation? What if we told them that sometimes people are mean, not because they are not good enough, but because that person is going through a hard time, or is self-conscious about their own insecurities?

I'm not suggesting we gloss over all of the ugliness in the world, but simply stop assuming the worst in every situation. Life is complicated, society is complicated, but if we start trying to view things through a positive (or at least neutral) lens, I think we will be much happier in our own lives and maybe that positivity can start to spread.

Best wishes,

~Megan